An Iki ningyo (living doll) of a basket vendor


Meiji era (1868-1912), late 19th centuryGesso and pigment over carved wood with inset hair, glass eyes and teeth of inlaid bone, modeled as a vendor of bamboo baskets, the figure realistically rendered and dressed in a fundoshi (loincloth) and zori (straw sandals), his face bearing a pained expression, his wares consisting of numerous baskets and containers of varying size and type, all individually woven from split bamboo or rattan, set on a wood base applied with emery 25 ¾ x 26 ½ x 13in (65.4 x 67.3 x 33cm)
|During the nineteenth century, iki ningyo ("living dolls") played a prominent role in popular urban culture; in Edo (present-day Tokyo), for example, highly realistic images of strange people from imaginary lands were exhibited in the precincts of Sensoji, the great Buddhist temple at Asakusa, and illustrated in 1855 by the woodblock-print artist Utagawa Kuniyoshi. The earlier, lifesize iki ningyo were intended for domestic consumption and were often arranged in dramatic tableaux, forming part of misemono, exhibitions held alongside temple fairs where animated freaks and entertainments could be enjoyed for a few coppers. In the early years of Japan's renewed contact with the outside world iki ningyo quickly garnered a global reputation, their painstaking workmanship and eerie realism inspiring museums in Europe and the United States, including the Smithsonian Institution and the Peabody Essex Museum, to commission lifesize figures of people from everyday life; samurai scenes were also popular.Before long, smaller-scale iki-ningyo like the present two lots were commissioned by Yokohama firms catering to foreign travelers; the occupations depicted appealed to wealthy tourist taste and are often the same as those seen in hand-colored photograph albums of the same period, with rickshaw-pullers and basket-peddlers among the favored subjects. Strikingly realistic, complete in every possible anatomical detail, and (apart from the figures) made from the same materials as the objects they represent, these two models are of exceptionally high quality.The basket-peddler carries a larger array of wares than most other surviving dolls; compare a slightly smaller example in the National Museum of Ethnology, Leiden, Netherlands, exhibited in Kumamoto in 2006, http://www.camk.or.jp/event/exhibition/ikiningyou2/. Further information on iki ningyo and their historical background can be found in Alan Scott Pate, Ningyo: The Art of the Japanese Doll, Boston, Tuttle, 2005, pp. 241-244, and Japanese Dolls: The Fascinating World of Ningyo, North Clarendon VT, Tuttle, 2008, pp. 142-153 (see fig. 212 in the latter publication for a comparable figure of a rickshaw-puller).